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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2004 Week 09 Hansard (Tuesday, 17 August 2004) . . Page.. 3687 ..

this is what this type of legislation is making us do. With the regressive amendments to the Bail Act that have already been passed by this Assembly, the Government is heading down the well-trodden path of trying to win public popularity by ramping up penalties, removing defences to prosecution and making it harder for those charged with offences to defend themselves.

There is no evidence that locking up more people for longer reduces crime. We only have to look at the United States to see that despite having the highest prison population of any OECD country, they continue to have the highest crime rates. This is particularly the case with drug users and small-time drug dealers, who are simply replaced the second they are imprisoned. The market continues even though they are in jail. The prison environment is hardly conducive to reducing drug dependency, and is far more likely to make these matters worse, as well as putting addicts and small-time dealers in the perfect environment to strengthen their drug supply networks when released.

I refer the government and the opposition to the work that the community services and social equity committee has done, looking at what happens to families when someone is incarcerated for a crime, or when people have contact with the criminal justice system and the impact it has on that person and the impact it has on their families. We also looked at why people are being incarcerated in the first place. It is disappointing to see this legislation progressing without any reference to the work that has been done by that committee and also by the health committee in this Assembly in looking at these issues.

The government bill before us is clearly a one-sided approach to dealing with drugs, with the focus solely on the supply of drugs. Once again, the government has failed to do anything about the demand side. This legislation does nothing to address the issues of harm minimisation, nothing to reduce drug addiction and nothing to reduce the risk to drug takers. The government is trying to create an artificial distinction between drug users and drug suppliers. It is trying to say that you can somehow divide drug issues into simple stand-alone segments and use a different policy response to each part. That is simply absurd. The rationale for this bill is that drug supply is somehow a different issue, completely divorced from drug use, and that a policy of zero tolerance for drug supply can be combined with a policy of harm minimisation in relation to drug use.

This is an inconsistent approach that will ultimately lead to failure. For the past century a “tough on drugs” approach or a “zero tolerance” approach to drugs has failed in this country and around the world, and it will fail again under these laws. We had an opportunity to refocus how we are approaching drug laws, to look at what has gone wrong over the past century and try something new, but all we have is this Criminal Code (Serious Drug Offences) Amendment Bill. So it is ironic that despite all the talk about harm minimisation measures, the only thing the government will do to tackle drug abuse is legislate harsher penalties. We have no heroin trial, no safe injecting room, and no real discussion about how to move harm minimisation forward. We just have higher penalties. The bill is a clear admission of failure to tackle drug problems in the territory, and the government’s bill will sentence more Canberrans to wasted lives with little hope for recovery or treatment.

I also draw the government’s attention to its own Human Rights Act. While the government has made a great deal publicly about the Human Rights Act, when it comes to following this law its record is questionable. We do not have the Attorney-General’s

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